Mr. Mustard

[sebcp5]

Mr. Mustard
Mr. Mustard was the name of an excellent stick of chewing gum, that resided, right up till this morning, in a vending machine in Metro Plaza Castilla, in Madrid.

Mr. Mustard was very proud of his abilities to calm the nerves of the person chewing him, and to lower his desire to eat, by way of mastication. He was sure that he would be picked up for a euro by some adolescent girl, on her way home from school, and chewed for a while, before being thrown in some bin, or under the tracks of the metro. Not a very dignified ending for Mr. Mustard, but Mr. Mustard was above all that. His aim was to serve.

So when, at ten thirty-seven in the morning, that morning, Mr. Mustard was drawn out of his machine by an extremely fat, pig-eyed old woman wearing brown tights, and muttering indistinctly to herself about the folly and intolerable rudeness of youth, he put on his best flavour, and sat still. Moving down the tunnel towards the platform, the hag unstripped Mr. Mustard (but he had been instructed in these manners of pornography), and pulled succulently, teasingly on his tender flesh. Mr. Mustard could see her mouth begin to salivate, indeed globules of saliva were at that moment descending in his direction. The old woman bended him in two with the dexterity of a spider turning its pray, and all at once, lobbed Mr. Mustard into her mouth.

He saw next to nothing of a pair of thin, withered lips, but the tongue, oh the tongue. Now Mr. Mustard was in ecstasy. He had read, of course, all the manuals and learned books on different mouth types in preparation for his career as a stick of gum, but nothing had prepared him for this. The theory said that old women's tongues were dried and that the chewing was a rasping matter, with little enjoyment. This old woman's tongue was thick and soft and fat and long, juicy as it was sweet, and Mr. Mustard just let her give it to him.

Later, through the hole in her mouth, outside her teeth, Mr. Mustard could see other people sitting down in the metro. There was a chinese girl, a thin, scared looking girl, tall, peering somewhat anxiously and occasionally at Mr. Mustard. No doubt chinese grandmothers did not chew gum in public. There was a very large man with a large bag. The man bore a two day stubble, and his mouth seemed to move a lot, though there was no gum inside it. A gaggle of schoolgirls stood motionless by the door. A guide dog and its blind woman were sitting nearby.

Suddenly, without a warning, the hag opened her gob and spat Mr. Mustard onto the floor. He landed just behind the black labrador guide dog. Just then the train stopped at Callao, and the blind dog made for the exit. Only Mr. Mustard had gotten stuck to his right hind paw.

This should prove interesting he ruminated. The dog padded out into Plaza Callao and stopped by three beggars sitting next to each other. Mr. Mustard could see that they had several change boxes laid out. The first one read: for dope. The second one: for beer. The third: at least we're honest. Mr. Mustard laughed in spite of himself, but before he knew it, the middle beggar, the dirtiest, most slovenly looking one, was picking him out of the dog's hind paw, and had put him in his mouth.

This time the experience was different. The gums and lips were almost black. The tongue was shrivelled, green, and smelt funny, though Mr. Mustard, in his almost perfect innocence, could not put a name to it. There were few, in fact no teeth to name of that Mustard could see, except a sharp one towards the back, which this sordid little fellow skewered Mr. Mustard through and through on, using his darting, green tongue.

Then Mr. Mustard found himself spat up into the air again with great vehemence, and he landed in the hand of a splay legged man, of very dirty skin, who held Mr. Mustard in his hand. Thanking the beggar on the ground, this dirty man, also a beggar, went with Mr. Mustard in his mouth to Kentucky Fried Chicken, in Gran Via, or just outside it, where the man took up residence outside the doors. When a kindly woman left the beggar a chicken wrap, Mr. Mustard was not removed, but was all mixed up with lettuce, wrap, mayonnaise, and hot chicken.

This is gooood! Mumbled Mr. Mustard, but before he knew it, he and his chickeny friends were slithering down this man's gullet, and entered his stomach. Now Mr. Mustard knew that his time had come. He lay there quietly, and the acids did their work.

As he dissolved, he pondered on his experiences. He wondered why, just why, that first fat old hag's eyes had looked just so much like a pig's. He wondered why that big man in the metro never stopped grimacing and moving his mouth. Maybe he had some sort of motor neurone disorder, pondered Mr. Mustard. He wondered if the hag had been in love with him, and just what love was, or why, or wherefore love should come to a humble stick of chewing gum. He recollected the disgrace of being pinned and skewered onto the first beggar's only pointed tooth. He asked himself if Mr. Mustard was his real name, or if that was just the name on his packet.

And as he thought all this, stomach acids melted his little but dignified brain, and he started the path towards the Madrid sewers, where all of us, one day, must go.

[patrick]

Seb thanks a good tale which I needed after discovering that a neighbour's gardener had chopped straight throu my 40? long vine
by mistake -it was giving 70-100 bunches a year!!!and was beautiful cheers P

[sebcp5]

sorry to hear that Patrick

[PiratePrincess]

Hi Seb, this reminds me of a story that I wrote as a kid about coffee beans..... and the little posters "save the coffee beans" that I drew. (They were scared of getting brewed as it was painful, they did not want to die and they were in danger of becoming extinct).
So ccuuute, gives a different perspective! but if I start pretending that things are alive, I will talk to everything and feel bad when I use my cat-doorstop

[robby]

Hi Seb,
I don't like reading stories that much, but this one put a smile on my face, cute and when it comes to Kentucky Fried Chicken, well now my tummy is rumbling.
Nice story thank you, God Bless

[sebcp5]

Thanks for the comments!